Hybrids by Robert J. Sawyer is the third book in a series entitled The Neanderthal Parallax. The premise of this series is that there is another universe where Neanderthals, not Homo sapiens, became the dominant series. In the first book, Neanderthal Ponter Boddit opened a portal into our world and the two civilizations made contact.
The crux of Hybrids seems to be that Porter and Homo sapiens geneticist Mary Vaughn are in love and trying to plan their life together, including marriage and children. Conceiving such a child is, of course, problematic since the two species have different number of chromosomes. So, they must go to the Neanderthal universe and find a banned machine that can manipulate DNA.
This is an interesting concept, one that has played out on the TV show Sliders, for instance, with Cro Magnons instead of Neanderthals. However, I do have some issues. It bothers me how often alternate universes are seen as idealic compared to ours. The Neanderthals have none of the problems of civilization that we do — overcrowding, depletion of resources, pollution, etc. In fact, they are more far-reaching that us. Seriously? We humans may have messed some stuff up, but why would another universe have it altogether, with no problems to be seen?
Another strange element is that all of the Neanderthals are bi-sexual, spending only four days a month with their opposite-sex mate and the remainder of the time with their same-sex spouses. It’s hard to fathom that an entire species would be bi-sexual.
There are also some scientific inaccuracies. The book talks about humans having “defeated” Neanderthals in our world. That implies some sort of conflict. Prevailing theories are that we were more highly adapted to our environment, and more recently, that we simply interbred with them, so that their species failed to exist.
Another issue raised is that humans have the ability for religion and Neanderthals do not. To my knowledge there is no indication of religion found in Neanderthal settlements, nor is there any indication of art. If these two things go together and imply an ability of abstract thinking, Neanderthals should have neither. In this book, they obviously have imagination and the ability for foresight and innovation, or they couldn’t have created their civilization. But although Neanderthals in this book evolved a more sophisticated brain than in our own world, it seems that the two concepts are hard to split. I say, if they have the ability for one, they should have the ability for another.
The story of Hybrids is interesting and somewhat engaging, but for the reasons stated above, I will not go back and read the previous books. I have to believe in the premise before I can truly enjoy a book. In this case, I just don’t.